Rajeev Masand's Blind Item: Extravagance on Expense Account

Rajeev Masand's blind item in this week's Open Magazine is not as juicy as his previous ones:

Extravagance on Expense Account

It’s the hottest ticket this summer. A youthful multi-starrer filmed in Europe and produced by one of Bollywood’s top banners. Industry insiders are whispering that at a landing cost of roughly Rs 75 crore, it’s going to be hard for this film to make money, even if big numbers do flock the multiplexes when it opens. It turns out the lavish production flew stars and their ‘plus-ones’ First Class from Mumbai to the shoot location (and back). Once there, talent was checked into fancy suites at the finest five-star, and daily shopping excursions were organised for bored star-wives and accompanying families. The show-off producer even hired a luxury cruise at one point during the roughly 40-day schedule, so spouses and girlfriends could keep themselves occupied while the stars and crew remained busy on set.

With such extravagant but unnecessary expenses, it’s hardly surprising that the film’s actual production budget escalated to a whopping Rs 50 crore, to which the producers have reportedly added a fat margin of close to Rs 25 crore. It’s being bankrolled by a top distributor who has had to shell out these big bucks and then pray that his investment doesn’t go down the drain. Meanwhile, the producers continue to revel in the reputation of being one of Bollywood’s coolest and most generous film-making companies. All very well, except that none of this generosity is coming out of their own pockets.